


save, saving, saved

by firebrands



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Roommates/Housemates, Domestic Fluff, Fluff, Getting to Know Each Other, M/M, Platonic Cuddling, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-22
Updated: 2020-06-22
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:34:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,343
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24861640
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/firebrands/pseuds/firebrands
Summary: simple joys, or: tony exhausting himself trying to help literally everyone and steve tutting and making him noodlesfill for mystony bingoprompt: chronic hero syndrome; also for anon on tumblr who asked for roommate au!
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Comments: 23
Kudos: 185
Collections: Captain America/Iron Man Bingo





	save, saving, saved

Steve pads out of his bedroom and stops when he sees Tony in the kitchen, leaning against the counter as he types on his phone. The kettle is beginning to sing, and Tony huffs and drops his phone before turning off the flame.

“It’s four in the morning.”

Tony looks up at Steve with a start. “I wanted noodles.”

Steve sighs and massages his temples before walking to the fridge and pulling out a bottle of water. “Do you rest? Ever?” He asks, after taking a drink.

“Why are you acting surprised, honestly,” Tony says, not looking at Steve as he tears open a foil flavor packet with his teeth and dunks its powdery contents into a steaming bowl.

Steve stifles a yawn and leans his hip against the counter. “You know,” he starts. Tony’s head tilts to his phone, which buzzes with a notification. Steve very gently lays his hand over it, making Tony look up at him. “You know, you don’t have to do everything.”

Tony’s lips quirk into a condescending smile. “But I can, so.”

Steve slides Tony’s phone closer to himself, and Tony lunges forward, reaching out for it. “Hey—”

“Go to sleep,” Steve says firmly.

“You know I can access my messages from my laptop,” Tony says, taking a step back and reestablishing acceptable space between them.

Steve smirks at Tony. “Thanks for the tip,” he says as he pockets Tony’s phone and runs to Tony’s room. Tony realizes what he’s done a second too late, and he fumbles around the furniture as he tries to beat Steve to his room.

Steve hugs Tony’s laptop to his chest, smiling triumphantly.

Tony narrows his eyes at the abject betrayal. “I have important stuff to do, Steve.”

“Yeah, like eat your noodles and go to bed.”

Tony scrunches up his face and walks back to the kitchen, dragging his feet. Steve follows, smiling all the while.

“I hate you,” Tony says, and begins noisily eating his noodles. “Do you want some,” he asks, tone flat.

Steve shakes his head in response. “No you don’t,” he says, a teasing grin still on his face.

Tony rolls his eyes and turns back to his noodles. “No, I don’t,” he murmurs under his breath.

* * *

“How was your day?” Steve doesn’t even turn to look when Tony enters the apartment, can tell who it is from the heavy sigh that follows once the door clicks shut.

“Which part of it?” Tony groans, dumping his bags on the floor then falling, face-first, onto the couch.

Steve reduces the heat on the stove and walks up to Tony. After a few seconds of being disregarded, Steve pokes him in the shoulder. “I’m making spaghetti.”

Tony makes a broken sound, then turns up to smile weakly at Steve. “You’re my favorite, you know?”

Steve grins. “Yeah, I know.” As he continues cooking, he can hear the tell-tale signs of Tony resuming work—whichever aspect of work that may be. Steve knows he’s helping with Stark Industries already, developing designs for his dad. But he knows too that Tony’s helping out with more than a few school organizations; from what he remembers, he’d offered to help automate student council elections, set up the website of the Herald, and was helping some mechanical engineering freshmen with their projects as a favor to one of their professors. On top of that, he managed to volunteer time for the advocacy groups, too—donating money and setting up partnerships.

Tony’s in the middle of a call by the time the food’s ready. Steve waves his hand at Tony, who is standing by the window, pacing.

Tony raises his eyes in response and holds a finger up, and Steve sits down with a sigh. Tony was doing too much. Ever since they became roommates, he was always doing too much, and a small part of him feels that Tony only suggested that they become roommates because Steve had asked. Which is to say, Tony never said no to anyone who asked anything of him.

“Sorry,” Tony says, sliding onto the seat opposite Steve and almost slamming his phone, face down, onto the table.

Tony rests his head in his hands, and sighs again.

“You okay?”

“Thanks for cooking.”

“You’re welcome,” Steve grins, and they tuck in. “You still have work to do?”

“Yeah I have a few more lines of code left to do for the website, and then I can send it off to beta testing. Then I can start revisions on the system for elections, and, well. You know. How are you, though? How was your day?”

Steve looks up from his food and cocks his head. “Fine. Working on a new painting.”

“Can I see?”

“Yeah, when I’m done,” Steve says with a laugh.

They’re silent for a while.

“You sure you can’t take a break tonight?” Steve asks.

“Oh, why? Something urgent?”

“No,” Steve says, shaking his head and sighing. “You just seem really tired.”

“Well,” Tony says, noncommittal. “You know.”

“Yeah, I know.”

* * *

It’s happened often enough that when Steve finds Tony passed out on the couch, he doesn’t make a fuss. Instead, just gets a blanket from Tony’s room and drapes it over him.

Today he feels a little kinder than usual, so he adjusts Tony’s head on the pillow, and leaves a glass of water beside him.

* * *

It’s another ungodly hour in the morning when Steve finds Tony working in the kitchen. When Tony sees him, he turns away and stifles a sniffle.

“Are you okay?” Steve asks, rushing toward him.

“Yeah,” Tony murmurs, still turned away from Steve.

“Hey.” Steve gently turns Tony to face him, recognizing that Tony doesn’t have a cold—he’s crying.

“I’m just really tired,” Tony says, laughing despite the tears running down his cheeks. “But I’m okay.”

“If this is okay, then I’d hate to see what bad is,” Steve says, smiling a little. He hands Tony a paper towel, and Tony blows his nose noisily. “Wanna talk about it?”

“No, it’s fine, I really need to finish this thing,” Tony says, waving his hand around and gesturing vaguely to his laptop.

“No, you don’t,” Steve says, wrapping an arm around Tony’s waist. “C’mere.” He leads them to the couch and sits Tony back down. He doesn’t need to say anything—Tony immediately buries his face in Steve’s shoulder and lets out another soft whimper, like he’s holding it back.

“I know I sound insane because I took all of this on and I’m just—I’m trying, and it’s hard, and it shouldn’t be, and it wouldn’t be so hard if I just stopped _crying_ ,” Tony says, all in one breath. “It’s dumb, you can laugh,” he adds wetly.

“I’m not laughing,” Steve says soothingly, rubbing a hand up and down Tony’s back. He’s never seen Tony cry before, and it makes a lump form in his throat, but he pushes past it.

They sit like that for a while, almost tangled together.

“You shouldn’t beat yourself up like this,” Steve says, after a while.

“I know, I know,” Tony says harshly. He pushes himself off Steve’s chest and looks up at him. “But I know that I can, too.”

Steve shakes his head softly, and pulls Tony back, worried that at any moment Tony would scamper away and take his laptop with him. “You need to say no to people, Tony.”

“But I can _do it_ ,” Tony insists, but he tucks his head closer against Steve’s shoulder.

“I know you can.” Steve breathes in, steadies himself, and then runs a hand through Tony’s hair. “But not all at once.”

Tony sags against him, letting out a deep breath. They fall into silence, again, and the next thing Steve knows he jolts awake because his head was falling forward.

Tony’s still tucked against him, breathing softly against Steve’s neck.

Steve smiles to himself, settling into the couch and tightening his embrace around Tony. If this is what it takes to get Tony to sleep, then he doesn’t mind at all.

**Author's Note:**

> now with a sorta sequel: [the adventures of rogers and stark](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25127656)
> 
> i'm on [tumblr](https://firebrands.tumblr.com/) and [twitter](https://twitter.com/firebrandss)!


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